Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1886 [PAGE 216]

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208

TABLE V—Gives amount of dry food eaten, gain made, pounds of dry food required to produce pound of pork, and nutritive ratio of f jod eaten. Nutriti ratio

Kecord of 21 days. Lot. Solids eaten. A B C 230 lbs. 213 '« 248 " Gain. P o u n d s of solids to p o u n d s of pork. 3,020 3,520 2,802

•

S

1:8. 1:S 1:5-

VALUE OF SKIM-MILK.

By reference to Table IV it will be seen that for a period of three weeks it required 4.148 pounds of corn meal to produce a pound of pork, and that 13.6 pounds of skim-milk, when fed with corn meal, produced a pound of pork; 3.25 pounds of skim-milk being, in this case, equivalent to 1 pound of corn meal. It does not at all follow that when fed alone, or with some other food, or in some other proportion, the same result would be obtained. Under other conditions the result might have been less or more favorable to the skimmilk. At the time the experiment was being conducted corn at this place was worth 28 cents a bushel, or, not considering the cost of grinding, \ cent a pound. The skim-milk was, therefore, worth 15 cents per hundred pounds. The changing of the milk from Lot C to Lot B clearly indicates that individual difference^ can not account for the increased gain when milk was given, although it is evident that no exact statement can be made in regard to these lots for the last period of three weeks, because the pigs had been previously under dissimilar conditions on account of differences in diet.

SHELLED CORN VS. CORN MEAL.

Beferring again to Table IV, it will be seen that for a period of three weeks it required 4.148 pounds of corn meal to produce a pound of pork, while it required 3.637 pounds of shelled corn to produce a pound of pork, or .511 pounds less in the latter* case. One bushel of shelled corn produced 15.4 pounds of pork; when ground it produced but 13.5 pounds. Beferring to Tables I and II it will be seen that lot A ate 271 pounds of shelled corn and gained 74J- pounds, while lot B ate 251 pounds of corn meal and gained 60£ pounds. The pigs fed on shelled corn, therefore, not only gained more in proportion to the amount eaten, but they ate more and gained more absolutely, as well as relatively. The fact of the pig eating more, and apparently having the ability to eat more shelled corn than corn meal, is a possible explanation of this better relative gain. A smaller proportion of the foodi eaten was necessary to supply the waste of the system.

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